SMS predictations are revised upwards

Portio Research takes an optimistic outlook for Mobile Messaging Futures 2007 - 2012. It upwardly revises previous predictions from 2005 - SMS growth has not flattened out in mature markets but continued to boom whilst the US market has grown much faster than expected. By 2012, global SMS revenue will reach $67b, driven by 3.7 trillion messages.

The report states that just in Asia 450 people every minute will get their first mobile phone - and the adoption will tick along at this rate for the next 6 years.

Portio reckons that Mobile IM will supplant SMS as the principle messaging service by 2011. I strongly disagree - because IM currently requires opt-in. Admittedly, interconnectivity between IM providers has occurred technically, but the mass market certainly hasn't appreciated this yet, nor is IM embedded at all with the weak exception of the US.

Mobile handsets for the developing world

This BBC article reports on the user growth in India and the associated scrum from the handset manufacturers.

Interestingly, the article mentions the fact that improved phone locking techniques (ie locking the handset to a SIM or locking it to a network provider) means that phones 'stay with' the network provider. This in turns enables the operators to subsidise the cost of the handset to the subscriber, thereby lower the entry barrier to adoption - further driving growth.

This, of course, will reduce handset churn (a essential component if the network and handsets are rapidly evolving; Question: has development plateaued suitably for this step to be appropriate) and hamper the second hand market (good at preventing theft and resale of mobile phones - a big problem in London, for example).